t, me lad," he said when he could speak. "It's me legs
that's caught, not me body. But give a hand to the min, there. The
Eyetalians are underneath."

Disregarding his suggestion, however, we began working about him, every
man throwing away bricks like a machine; but he would not have it.

"'Tind to the min!" he insisted with all of his old firmness. "The
Eyetalians are under there--Matt an' Jimmie. Can't ye see that I'll be
all right till ye get thim out? Come, look after the min!"

We fell to this end of the work, although by now others had arrived, and
soon there was a great crowd assisting--men coming from the yard and the
machine shop. Although embedded in this mass of material and most
severely injured, there was no gainsaying him, and he still insisted on
directing us as best he could. But now he was so picturesque, so much
nobler, really, than he had been in his healthier, uninjured days. A
fabled giant, he seemed to me, half-god, half-man, composed in part of
flesh, in part of brick and stone, gazing down on our earthly efforts
with the eye of a demi-god.

"Come, now--get the j'ists from aaf the end, there. Take the bricks away
from that man. Can't ye see? There's where his head is--there. There!
Jasus Christ--theyer!"

You would have thought we were Italians ourselves, poor wisps of
nothing, not his rescuers, but slaves, compelled to do his lordly
bidding.

After a time, however, we managed to release him and all his five
helpers--two dead, as I say, and Matt badly cut about the head and
seriously injured, while Jimmie, the imperturbable, was but little the
worse for a brick mark on one shoulder. He was more or less frightened,
of course, and comic to look at, even in this dread situation. "Big-a
smash," he exclaimed when he recovered himself. "Like-a da worl' fall.
Misha Rook! Misha Rook! Where Misha Rook?"

"Here I am, ye Eyetalian scalawag," exclaimed the unyielding Rourke
genially, who was still partially embedded when Jimmie was released.
There was, however, a touch of sorrow in his voice as he added weakly,
"Arre ye hurted much?"

"No, Misha Rook. Help Misha Rook," replied Jimmie, grabbing at bricks
himself, and so the rescue work of "Rook" went on.

Finally he was released, although not without deprecating our efforts
the while (this wonderful and exceptional fuss over him), and exclaiming
at one point as we tugged at joists and beams rather frantically, "Take
yer time. Take yer time. I'm nah